“I‘m here to announce that we’re building Iron Man,” President Obama told reporters at the White House last year. While he was being a little facetious, rapid progress is being made toward developing exoskeletons that may look like a nascent version of the fictional superhero.
Funded by the military, corporations and universities, researchers are quickly developing exoskeletons that would allow troops to lift heavier objects and travel more, but with less exertion, leaving them less fatigued on the battlefield.
In an interview with CNN this month, U.S. Special Operations Command chief Gen. Joe Votel said he hoped that the first incarnation of such an exoskeleton would be operational in 2018.
Developers say that the battery-powered Tactical Assault Light Operator Suit, or TALOS, will include an armored helmet with built-in optics and communications; ballistics protection for up to 60 percent of an operator’s body (versus 20 percent available to forces today); wound-sealing foam guns; and a cooling system that involves pumping water through three feet of tubing. The suit will weigh close to 400 pounds, but through an array of sensors, will predict how a user wants to move and act accordingly with the aid of hydraulics.
Since 2001, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, has spent millions on what it calls the “Exoskeletons for Human Performance Augmentation Program.” That includes $2.9 million awarded to Harvard’s Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering last year to develop a “soft exo-suit” that could represent a more efficient sibling to TALOS. It wouldn’t provide the same level of ballistics protection, but it would be lighter and employ much of the same technology.
According to Wyss, the lightweight suit will contain a “network of supple strain sensors that act as the ‘brain’ and ‘nervous system’ ” of the suit, “continuously monitoring various data signals, including the suit tension, the position of the wearer (e.g., walking, running, crouched), and more.”
While the first version of the suit is intended to reduce musculoskeletal injuries among military personnel by reducing weight strain on their bones and ligaments, Wyss notes, future versions could also have commercial applicability in assisting civilians with limited mobility.
The military isn’t the only customer for such technology. Engineers at Aalborg University in Denmark are hoping to release the first prototype of the AXO Suit next year, which aims to help elderly people get around by reducing the amount of energy required for physical activity by 30 to 50 percent.
However, one researcher on the AXO project emphasized that he doesn’t want to scare users away by using futuristic terms.
“There is also a social challenge in terms of whether or not our potential end users will accept the technology,” said Shaoping Bai, associate professor at the Department of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering at the university. “That’s why we call it a tool instead of a robot. Just the word robot will keep more conservative people from trying it. It smells of Robocop or Iron Man. We’d like people to think of it as a tool or as an aid instead.
